Category Archives: Bell Labs

40 years ago today (October 15, 1973), Dennis Ritchie and Ken Thompson presented their first paper on Unix at the fourth ACM Symposium on Operating Systems Principles (SOSP) held at Purdue University. The paper will later be published in the … Continue reading →

Today in 1891, Almon Brown Strowger was issued a patent for his electromechanical switch to automate telephone exchanges. Steven Lubar in InfoCulture: “…a Kansas City undertaker, Strowger had a good practical reason for inventing the automatic switchboard. Legend has it that his … Continue reading →

Today in 1950, the invention of the phototransistor was announced by Bell Telephone Laboratories. This was a transistor operated by light rather than electric current, invented by Dr. John Northrup Shive. A few weeks ago, Bob Metcalfe reviewed a new history of Bell … Continue reading →